Your family’s photos are fading. Someone has to save them.
We collect your family’s old photographs, carefully scan them, restore your favourites, and return everything in a beautiful chest engraved with your family name.
The photos are still in the cupboard. That’s the trouble.
Every year, photographs fade and the people who remember their stories grow older. One day, those memories could be lost forever.
Five steps, and you only do one of them.
We send the chest
It arrives engraved with your family’s name.
Don’t sort. Just fill the chest.
Put everything in, with a sticker on your favourites.
See what can go inWe collect it
An insured courier collects it from you.
Your First Look
We restore 10 of your photos first, so you can see the quality before we do the rest.
It all comes home
Your originals come back whole, with the restored prints and a memory stick.
Photos and albums, in any state.
- Printed photos of any size, colour or black and white
- Photo albums, even the sticky kind (we scan in place if photos won’t come out safely)
- School and studio portraits
- Polaroids
Because of passwords and privacy, we don’t take devices.
- Phones and tablets
- Laptops and computers
- Hard drives and other devices
Not yet: slides, negatives, tapes, CDs, DVDs, documents and digital files.
Restored, not replaced.
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A real restoration from our pilot. Colour back, damage mended.
Careful craft, checked by hand.
- 1We scan every photo at high resolution.
- 2We repair fading, tears, scratches and stains with professional tools, including AI.
- 3A person checks every photo against the original before it comes home.
Some photos are too blurry to sharpen. When the detail isn’t in the original, we repair the colour and damage, leave the face as it is, and tell you which ones.
Memory Chest was created by two of South Africa’s leading post-production specialists.
See what we can do with one of your photos.
- 1Send one photo.
- 2We restore it.
- 3It comes back with a note, and a look at what a full chest can do.
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Your photo is with us. We’ll send it back restored within 48 hours.
One photo per family. Back within 48 hours.
The photographs are back. So are the memories.
Faces you haven’t seen in decades. Stories you’d almost forgotten. All beautifully restored, ready to share with the people who matter.
The chest
Solid wood, engraved with your family name.
The prints
A new print of every restored photo.
The memory stick
128 GB, every photo dated and named, plus a three-month download link.
Which chest is right for you?
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Three ways to keep them.
Keepsake Chest
For your favourite family photographs.
R15 000Scanned: everything in the chest
Restored: 150 favourites, dated and named
- A new print of every restored photo
- First Look: 10 restored within 5 working days
Family Chest
For generations of photographs and memories.
R25 000Scanned: everything in the chest
Restored: 300 favourites, dated and named
- Everything in Keepsake, plus:
- Arranged by year and by person
- The Reveal Kit
- Home before the day, our date promise
Heirloom Chest
For preserving your family’s photographs and the stories behind them.
R40 000Scanned: everything in the chest
Restored: 500 favourites, dated and named
- Everything in Family, plus:
- A bound photo book of the family story
- A framed A3 print of the best photo
- Memory sticks for up to 4 sibling households
- The Storyteller Session (Gauteng and Cape Town): we record the family’s storyteller naming the people and telling the stories
We confirm a firm quote once we see what’s in your chest. You’ll never pay more than your tier unless you add photos.
Add-ons
Three promises, in writing.
The First Look Promise
If you don’t love your first 10 restored photos, we send everything back, insured, you don’t owe the balance, and you keep your chest.
True to the original
If a restored face doesn’t look like the person in the photo, we redo it or give you the straight repair instead.
Home before the day
Tell us your date when you reserve. We’ll check it against your chest and our queue, and confirm in writing whether we can make it. If we miss a date we’ve confirmed, we refund R5 000.
What families ask us.
I don’t have time to sort hundreds of photos.+
You don’t. Fill the chest. We scan everything and restore your favourites. We include stickers, so put one on the photos you love most and we’ll restore those first. If you don’t mark any, we choose the best of them for you.
Will our albums be safe? The family won’t want them to leave the house.+
Insured in transit by courier, every item photographed on arrival, and every original returned. On Heirloom, we come to the house and pack it with them.
Nobody knows who half these people are.+
Name one face per person and we find the rest. We send you a short form for names and birth years, so tell us what you know. We use that to date each photo as closely as we can and to name the faces you’ve identified. If no one knows, we leave it blank rather than guess.
Will it just sit on a memory stick?+
Not with the Reveal Kit, which comes with Family and Heirloom: a 3-minute slideshow set to music, a reveal card, and story-prompt cards to ask the family’s storytellers. It turns the chest into a moment.
How does the Storyteller Session work, and is the recording private?+
We visit the family’s storyteller at home (in Gauteng and Cape Town): a mother, father, grandparent, aunt or uncle, whoever knows the stories. We pack the chest with them and record them naming the people and telling the stories. We record only with their consent, handle it under POPIA, and keep it with the family’s archive. It’s included in Heirloom and can be added to Keepsake or Family.
How do I get the digital copies?+
On a Memory Chest 128 GB memory stick, packed in the chest. We also email a download link that works for three months, so you can copy everything to your computer and phone. There’s no online library to log in to.
What happens to my photos and details?+
We handle your photos and personal information in line with POPIA. We use them only to restore your photos, we never share or sell them, and you can ask us to delete our copies at any time. Our privacy policy has the details.
How does the deposit work?+
R5 000 holds your place. It’s fully refundable until we engrave and send your chest, and it comes off your final quote. We confirm a firm quote once we’ve seen what’s in the chest. The balance is due only after you’ve approved your First Look.
Christmas is when the albums come out.
Give the chest itself to a parent or grandparent, engraved with the family’s name. The family fills it together, and we do the rest.
Ask us about giving a chestWe only take a few families a month. Our first families get a locked price on add-ons and a free framed print, in return for a short testimonial and permission to share their before-and-afters.
Reserve your chest.
R5 000 deposit holds your place. Fully refundable until we engrave and send your chest. It comes off your final quote. The balance is due only after you’ve approved your First Look.
Buying with your brothers and sisters? Split it, and everyone pays their share from one link.